Appropriately for a first episode of a new season, the topic covered is having a baby and the popular myths and misconceptions that surround women’s fertility, the issue of whether to breast-feed or feed a child formula, and maternal bonding. Emily and her partner are worried that her biological clock is ticking away and before long, she’ll hit the 35th-birthday mark which means her ability to conceive will start vanishing. Enter our chatty host Adam Conover who reassures Emily and partner by advising that a woman’s ability to fall pregnant after the age of 35 years will actually only fall a few percentage points and that even women in their prime years of fertility (late teens to late 20s) only have a successful pregnancy rate of less than 90%. Conover explains that the notion that reaching 35 years of age means that a woman’s ability to fall pregnant will plummet drastically is based on French census data collected from 1670 to 1830!

In a hypothetical scene, when Emily attends a garden party with her newborn child, two women guests start arguing over the breast-feeding versus infant formula issue. Conover brings in an expert who chastises both brawling biddies for their blinkered points of view. Later in the episode, Emily and her partner feel rather depressed that they’re not bonding with their baby as much as they believe they should and that caring for a baby turns out to be tedious, often boring and not much fun at all. Again, Conover tells them that maternal bonding is a very recent and uniquely Western concept and that in the past, when infant mortality rates were high, people were actually advised not to become attached to babies.

The news that turning 35 won’t hinder conceiving a child will be a relief for many women. Pity though that Conover does not consider why this particular myth is still so widespread in television, print and other media. The agenda behind pushing the idea that having a baby after the age of 35 years is close to impossible may well be sinister: it may be insinuating that young women should set aside their career aspirations and devote their time and energies to having children now rather than later. Likewise, other issues covered in the episode tend to be those on which parents are often harshly judged by their families, friends and peers. Unfortunately the show’s format and short running time don’t permit Conover to explore why new parents are often subjected to so much subjective criticism from others (plus subtle criticism from popular women’s magazines, news media and parents’ blogs) on their child-rearing skills to the extent that their relationship with each other and with their child could be strained.

The episode does have its silly moments but on the whole it’s easy on the eye and the ear and has a lot of energy thanks to Conover’s enthusiasm and clowning antics.